7 of the companies were not registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC, a fundamental requirement of the Public Procurement Act.
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By Archibong Jeremiah / ICIR
In 2019 the Cross River State Government awarded 40 contracts valued at over N6.9 billion to 31 companies. Of the 31, seven were illegally awarded contracts as they were not registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC, a fundamental requirement of the Public Procurement Act. Another seven benefiting companies lacked experience and expertise concerning the contract they were awarded. In this investigation, Archibong Jeremiah established that the same scheme took place in 2020. This time over N600 million was paid to nine companies that are not registered or recognised under the law.
Michael Ini was buried in his gaze locked onto the drama of a waste evacuation team struggling with their rickety truck to enter the dump site near his shop located in Lemna, Calabar, the Cross River State capital.
He was so immersed in the drama that he forgot the customer he was attending to was dying of thirst. “Poor men,” he said soberly. Questioning the reason for the comment, he quickly referred the customer to the scene of the tired men battling with their truck.
Quickly, this reporter hurried to the scene where the driver and his conductor, with no hand glove and nothing to protect the nose, eye, and entire head but just a pair of old boots, battled the mountain of refuse in front of them.
The exhausted men when approached by this reporter referred to a senior staff member who spoke on anonymity for fear of victimisation. “Our working conditions here are poor, once employed you are alone. You get your boots and gloves yourself,” he lamented.
He further disclosed: “We don’t have any health care system, we don’t have good machines,” adding that, “we get fuel for four hours to power our bulldozer and it’s expected to carry us for the eight hours we work.”
The contract to manage the dump site and eleven others valued at over N600 million, awarded by the state government formed the basis of this six-week investigation by CrossRiverWatch, revealing a large-scale breach of the public procurement processes.
Procurement violation
Parmus Multi Ventures and APP Mary Integrated Limited, both companies not registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC, were paid N29,025,500 each to manage the Lemna dump site. Skybaks Multi Concept Ltd, another unregistered company, was paid N12,321,000 for quality assurance monitoring and inspection for the same dump site. The contracts violate the Cross River State Procurement Law, 2020 (Law No. 9).
Given the fact that the state procurement law was first enacted in 2007 and was reenacted in 2019, a year after the contracts were awarded, one would imagine that due diligence would have followed to set a precedent, but the reverse was the case. Twelve contracts out of the twenty-seven awarded between February, March, April, August, and October 2020 were awarded in manners that question the integrity of the state government.
Awarding eleven contracts to companies not incorporated by the CAC breaches Part 3, Section 6(b) of the State Procurement Law which states that all bidders “shall possess the legal capacity to enter into the procurement contract.”
The unqualified companies uncovered during this investigation are Maddox Product, APP Mary Integrated Limited, Skybaks Multi Concept Ltd, Patson Environmental Services, and Parmus Multi Ventures.
Others are Cost Guru and Associate, Seema Consult Ltd, Design Line Enterprise, and Asibya Nigeria Enterprise.
Patson Environmental Services later registered with the CAC on June 28, 2021, nearly two years after getting the contract award from the Cross River State government.
Another critical finding by this reporter is that none of the twelve projects was budgeted for, an act which violates Section 1.4, sub-section 1 of the procurement guidelines and rules. The section mandates that all projects “must have budgetary provision.”
Read full article on ICIR Website
In 2019 the Cross River State Government awarded 40 contracts valued at over N6.9 billion to 31 companies. Of the 31, seven were illegally awarded contracts as they were not registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC, a fundamental requirement of the Public Procurement Act. Another seven benefiting companies lacked experience and expertise concerning the contract they were awarded. In this investigation, Archibong Jeremiah established that the same scheme took place in 2020. This time over N600 million was paid to nine companies that are not registered or recognised under the law.
Michael Ini was buried in his gaze locked onto the drama of a waste evacuation team struggling with their rickety truck to enter the dump site near his shop located in Lemna, Calabar, the Cross River State capital.
He was so immersed in the drama that he forgot the customer he was attending to was dying of thirst. “Poor men,” he said soberly. Questioning the reason for the comment, he quickly referred the customer to the scene of the tired men battling with their truck.
Quickly, this reporter hurried to the scene where the driver and his conductor, with no hand glove and nothing to protect the nose, eye, and entire head but just a pair of old boots, battled the mountain of refuse in front of them.
The exhausted men when approached by this reporter referred to a senior staff member who spoke on anonymity for fear of victimisation. “Our working conditions here are poor, once employed you are alone. You get your boots and gloves yourself,” he lamented.
He further disclosed: “We don’t have any health care system, we don’t have good machines,” adding that, “we get fuel for four hours to power our bulldozer and it’s expected to carry us for the eight hours we work.”
The contract to manage the dump site and eleven others valued at over N600 million, awarded by the state government formed the basis of this six-week investigation by CrossRiverWatch, revealing a large-scale breach of the public procurement processes.
Procurement violation
Parmus Multi Ventures and APP Mary Integrated Limited, both companies not registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission, CAC, were paid N29,025,500 each to manage the Lemna dump site. Skybaks Multi Concept Ltd, another unregistered company, was paid N12,321,000 for quality assurance monitoring and inspection for the same dump site. The contracts violate the Cross River State Procurement Law, 2020 (Law No. 9).
Given the fact that the state procurement law was first enacted in 2007 and was reenacted in 2019, a year after the contracts were awarded, one would imagine that due diligence would have followed to set a precedent, but the reverse was the case. Twelve contracts out of the twenty-seven awarded between February, March, April, August, and October 2020 were awarded in manners that question the integrity of the state government.
Awarding eleven contracts to companies not incorporated by the CAC breaches Part 3, Section 6(b) of the State Procurement Law which states that all bidders “shall possess the legal capacity to enter into the procurement contract.”
The unqualified companies uncovered during this investigation are Maddox Product, APP Mary Integrated Limited, Skybaks Multi Concept Ltd, Patson Environmental Services, and Parmus Multi Ventures.
Others are Cost Guru and Associate, Seema Consult Ltd, Design Line Enterprise, and Asibya Nigeria Enterprise.
Patson Environmental Services later registered with the CAC on June 28, 2021, nearly two years after getting the contract award from the Cross River State government.
Another critical finding by this reporter is that none of the twelve projects was budgeted for, an act which violates Section 1.4, sub-section 1 of the procurement guidelines and rules. The section mandates that all projects “must have budgetary provision.”
Read full article on ICIR Website
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